THE GRAPES for négociant Neil Ellis’s Whitehall Chardonnay don’t come from the same vineyard that was used originally, but the Elgin beauty is as delightful as ever – and apparently it gets better with time in the bottle. Scored 94/100 in Winemag’s 2024 Report on South African Chardonnay, the 2022
THE TOP-RATED wine going into the final round of judging at the 2025 Veritas Awards – the biggest, longest-running wine competition in South Africa where very high scores are tough to come by. The 2021 vintage of Dornier’s Cape Bordeaux-style red blend Donatus – the name being Latin for a
For the first time, the story of South Africa’s most popular white wine cultivar has been brought together in a single publication: The Story of South African Sauvignon Blanc. The 248-page book offers the most complete overview of the variety to date, tracing its journey from the first plantings at
WINNER of the trophy for best South African red wine at the 2025 International Wine Challenge, the Beau Constantia Stella 2022 was released some months after the competition results were announced in London. “Full, smoky, meaty and incredibly appetising Syrah,” said the panel of judges. “Vibrant colour with mulberry, plum
THE 2024 VINTAGE of Mullineux ‘The Gris’ Semillon WO Swartland fetched the top price at the 2025 Cape Winemakers Guild Auction conducted by Strauss & Co at the Lord Charles Hotel in Somerset West. “An extremely rare variety, Semillon Gris is a uniquely South African phenomenon,” says winemaker Andrea Mullineux
Bellevue, the estate behind the world’s first bottled Pinotage sold to the public, continues to uphold a century of heritage with every vintage. To rediscover Bellevue Wine Estate is to taste more than just the wine. It is tasting history, honouring the pioneers and joining a journey that is still
SCORED 97 points and the international judges’ joint favourite overall at the 2025 Trophy Wine Show, Groot Phesantekraal’s 2023 Syrah was released at under R200pb – a great bargain relative to other top SA Shiraz wines selling for hundreds of rand more per bottle. Winemaker Richard Schroeder joined the farm
IT GOES without saying that ideally we’d like our wine to be made as naturally as possible. Good health all round please. However, while many wine producers proudly claim to be doing things organically, or biodynamically even, only some are up for what it takes to get their wines officially
IN 2019, the Jordan Estate in Stellenbosch Kloof was the first South African wine producer to plant Assyrtiko, a white, Greek grape variety indigenous to the island of Santorini… 2022 was the first vintage of Jordan Assyrtiko to be bottled, with quantities so tiny that for the first few years
IT’S NOT the first time that Groot Constantia Grand Constance has placed among the Top 10 gold medallists at Muscats du Monde in Burgundy, France. In July 2025 it was with the 2021 vintage, in 2024 it was with the 2019, and the estate has regularly earned gold from this
JUDGED ‘Best Red Wine Overall’ at the 2025 edition of South Africa’s premier wine competition, the Trophy Wine Show: the 2023 vintage of the Arenite Syrah from Hans von Staff-Reitzenstein’s Stellenzicht estate below the Helderberg mountains in Stellenbosch. Shiraz was first planted at Stellenzicht in the 1980s, the 1994 vintage
SOME OF South Africa’s top producers are not members of the Cape Winemakers Guild. Admission is by invitation only, and some who have been invited feel that the Guild is not for them. However, most of those who are active CWG members count among the country’s very best, most experienced
